Its All In The Hips
The place of samba and futsal in Brazilian Football
Most football history books point at Charles Miller, the Brazilian son of John, a Scot working for the Sao Paulo Railway Company, as the founding father of Brazilian football. After a study trip to England, young Charles returned to Sao Paulo in 1894 with a set of rules and a couple of footballs, plus the contagious intent to explain the new game to whoever would care to listen.
But Miller's sport, respectful as it was with the Hampshire FA rules, barely resembled the Brazilian football that we've come to know as a benchmark for creativity, fun and imagination. In the beginning of the 20th Century, football belonged in white-only clubs, an upper-class entertainment that the non-white could only watch from outside the doors of the pitches.
But around the same time, another development happened that would eventually change the course of Brazilian football -- a musical genre called samba was born.
Historians state that the first samba recorded in Brazil was "Pelo Telefone" (Through the phone) in 1917 in Rio de Janeiro, but regions with intense African immigration such as Bahia and Pernambuco were already singing and dancing similar rhythms at the beginning of the century.
The ancestors of a large number of Brazilians of African origin, in fact, come from Angola, Cape Verde and especially from what today is Benin, a neighbouring country of Nigeria, which is said by many to be the originators of voodoo. The Beninese slaves brought their religion and their percussion-intense music to the Northeast of Brazil, with special influence on the state of Bahia.
Nowadays in the region, both religion and percussion still remain almost intact in the Candomble cult and the spectacular drum sessions can be enjoyed by any tourist all year round, and especially during this Carnival week.
From Bahia, the music, the dance and the dazzling moves spread North and South, getting to Rio and Sao Paulo and intersecting with Mr. Miller's new sport. But the black population had to wait until the mid-1910s to join the thus far white-only teams. The first non-white star, Arthur Friedenreich, son of a German immigrant and an African Brazilian domestic worker, made his debut with the national team in 1914, but was still not allowed to use the tennis club premises with his white colleagues.
As the sport opened its borders to a wider range of players, samba was taking over the country, especially in the non-white communities. Blacks/mulattos and football supported each other: the game progressively gave its new players the chance to shine, while it incorporated a new style of play, filled with slick moves, boastfulness and surprise.
"The key word is ginga [something similar to swagger]," says Fernanda Sampaio, a samba dance teacher in Sao Paulo. "It's all in the hips: the way you balance your body is the key to samba, and is also the main reason behind our ease for dribbling. Take care of your centre of gravity. Kids here grow up learning both things -- football and samba -- at the same time, so the moves for both become mixed up."
But things become a bit more complicated once you start digging: "Yes, ginga is the word," agrees Xandi, a capoeira master from Salvador (Bahia). "But that concept comes originally from the capoeira, the fight disguised as dance that the African slaves brought from West Africa by the Portuguese cultivated for decades. Ginga means to balance your body back and forth."
"It's all related, of course," admits Fernanda. "That's why truly different players come from not only humble backgrounds, but also from the regions from Sao Paulo to the North, where samba and capoeira are more popular."
There are a set of well-known stereotypes in Brazil: Players from the South are tough, obedient and unimaginative -- disciplined stiffs, products of the German/Polish immigration and free from samba or capoeira influences.
The perfect defensive midfielder -- your archetypical Dunga -- centre-back or strongly built targetman comes from the states closer to Uruguay and Argentina. You'll find your fantasista, the dribble-happy winger -- or, in the words of Jorge Valdano referring to Rio de Janeiro-born Romario, "cartoon" striker -- further up North. This cliché has been reinforced by a series of Southern coaches with obvious defensive tendencies -- again, Dunga, plus Mano Menezes, Tite and current Brazilian national team manager Big Phil Scolari -- in recent years.
Of course, like many stereotypes, this one also has obvious flaws: Ronaldinho Gaucho is an excellent example of extremely unconventional player from the South -- although it's fair to mention that he's obsessed with samba -- while several exemplary disciplined, but not too technically gifted, players such as Mazinho came from the North.
But exceptions aside, dance and football are inextricably linked in Brazil. As Fernanda asserts: "Most samba steps and the most spectacular football dribbles have the same base. It's all in the hips and in your ability to follow the rhythm."
Eduardo Alvarez is ESPN’s Spanish correspondent.